


Practicalities

by ChrissiHR



Series: It's the Great Countdown, Darcy Lewis [30]
Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor - All Media Types
Genre: 31 Days Of Halloween, Alternate Universe - Magic, Alternate Universe - Practical Magic Fusion, Angst and Feels, Angst and Fluff and Smut, Angst with a Happy Ending, Babyfic, Bathtub Sex, Domestic Avengers, Domestic Fluff, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Sex, F/M, Fandom Fusion, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Humor, Fluff and Smut, Hurt/Comfort, Kidfic, Light Angst, Magic, Magical Fucking, Magical Realism, October 30, October Prompt Challenge, Practical Magic AU, Promptober, Romance, Stevie Nicks - Freeform, Witch!Darcy, Wordcount: 5.000-10.000, Wordcount: Under 10.000, don't @ me Deborah, good omens - Freeform, if you can't fuck in a bathtub full of magic, song prompt, that tub is full of magic, the bathtub sex tag shouldn't even exist
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-30
Updated: 2018-11-18
Packaged: 2019-01-26 21:57:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 9,569
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12567080
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChrissiHR/pseuds/ChrissiHR
Summary: Night 30 ...in which the nudity is entirely optional, as you well remember.[This Halloween 2017 advent story has been extended. New fic summary is as follows:]Darcy goes by 'Rogers-Lewis' to protect her family, but the people really in the know know she's an Owens ... and a witch. Steve mostly takes the magic in stride, but the Aunts know things about his past, things he might not be ready to know himself. When he finds out, Darcy is torn between her need to comfort him and the desire to share news she knows will make his day. If only he'll let her get a word in edgewise...





	1. Home School Means Something Else Entirely When You're An Owens

**Author's Note:**

  * For [GlynnisIsta8](https://archiveofourown.org/users/GlynnisIsta8/gifts).



> Prompt for @glynnisi: Darcy/Steve, Crystal by Stevie Nicks
> 
> (Hohmyjeebus, I love the soundtrack from this movie.)

“It’s lovely, really.” Darcy smiled wanly at the headmaster, clutching Steve’s hand in a death grip on one side, and one of the twins’ hands on the other. Amber and Autumn were due to start school in the fall and Steve thought it might be a good idea for Wanda Maximoff to go back and finish her final years of school while she was still young enough to fit in without much trouble. Out of the corner of her eye, Darcy watched Wanda meander along the edges of the quad at Ilvermorny, looking every bit as out of place as Darcy felt.

The school  _was_  lovely.

But this four hundred year old, prestigious private academy bore little resemblance to the liberal day school Darcy attended as a child. She wanted for her girls and Wanda, in the years she had remaining to complete, to have the same kind of boisterous, fun school experience Darcy enjoyed in her youth, not this privileged, out-of-touch academic program only granted to the three of them by invitation due to Steve’s and Wanda’s positions with the Avengers.

Darcy took a deep breath. “...and I’m sure the school has many fine qualities to recommend it, but—”

“You’re an Owens,” the headmaster finished for Darcy.

The nervous mother of two-turned-three blinked at the school administrator in surprise.

“My Uncle Simon remembers your Aunt Jet fondly from her tour with the USO through London in the forties.” The woman smiled and Darcy saw the resemblance to the man Aunt Jet only ever identified in her old photo albums as Captain Johnson. She nodded. “My maiden name was Angelina _Johnson_. I can assure you, I’d know a pair of Owens girls anywhere.” She turned her brilliant smile on the twins with their tell-tale heads: one pin-straight red and one dark brown curls.

Darcy couldn’t exactly deny it then. “I’ve seen your uncle in Aunt Jet’s scrapbooks.”

“Your mother?” The woman wondered. “Sally?”

“Ha!” Darcy shook her head and bumped her knuckles against Steve’s ribs to make clear she knew exactly the reputation that preceded her mother. “You’d think. No. Gillian. My dad—”

“The curse,” the woman tsk’d sadly.

But Darcy laughed. “No! He’s one of the lucky ones, but things didn’t work out for them. He’s not … one of us. You know.” She released Steve’s hand to slide hers up his arm and wrap it around his elbow. She squeezed, thanking her Aunt Sally again for whatever event came to pass that lifted the family’s curse before Darcy’s time. “Steve’s more open-minded.”

“Ah.” The headmaster nodded. “I see.” She took a deep breath and exhaled. “Well, it was worth a shot, but knowing your family history, I’m surprised you accepted the invitation to tour our campus at all.”

And Darcy was forced to admit, “It’s an opportunity I didn’t want to pass up for Wanda’s sake. If the aunts had their way,though—”

But she never got to finish her explanation. Out of a brief, whirling zephyr of autumn-colored leaves stepped her Aunts, Fran and Jet, already advancing on their nieces, arms spread wide.

“We knew you’d see reason!” they cried, pressing kisses to everyone’s cheeks. Steve blushed crimson to the roots of his hair.

“The girls can come home and stay with us during the school year,” Aunt Jet enthused, eyes alight with pleasure, hands clasped around Autumn’s and Amber’s shoulders.

Aunt Fran hustled Wanda back to the group with an arm around her shoulder, too. “You’ve got those quinjet things. You can visit anytime you like, but they’re Owenses, darling. They really ought to go to their home coven school, don’t you think? It’s only right.”

Wide-eyed, Wanda stared at Darcy, unsure how to respond, babbling, “Oh, but I’m not—”

“Don’t be silly, sweetheart,” Aunt Jet interrupted, laying her hands on Wanda’s cheeks to silence her protest. “Of course, you are!” She hustled Wanda over to stand beside Darcy who clasped the overwhelmed, young woman’s hand.

“In every generation, one redhead and one brunette,” Aunt Fran said with a smug expression, as if that explained everything.

Darcy slung an arm around Wanda. “They’re not wrong. I’ve always been the odd one out. You’ll love the coven school,” she said, leading her friend-cum-sister back to the SUV. “And the nudity is entirely optional.”


	2. Sometimes The Past is Best Left There

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'all, I have had this written for MONTHS. It's time to finish polishing it up and get the rest of the chapters posted. Should only be a few chapters or so total by the time I'm done editing. I'll know for sure in a day or two. Holler at me in the comments if you're excited to read more this Halloween!
> 
> (Please note the change in rating before reading further, though!)

“Mommy!”

In the kitchen, Darcy sucked in a sharp breath when the shout preceded a familiar clatter, like books or shoes tumbling down the stairs, followed by the unmistakable thump of a person quickly thereafter.

“I’m okay!” Amber bellowed.

“She’s bleeding!” Autumn tattled immediately.

“A scratch!” Wanda called down the stairwell. “It’ll heal before we leave. Don’t be such a brat,” Darcy heard Wanda scold Autumn.

Darcy smiled and waved a hand over the waffle batter bowl, casting a Foolproof spell on the spatula so it would fold the batter only until it came together while she stepped away. With a flick of an impatient finger at the coffeemaker, she reheated the remainder of the pot without scorching it and flicked another finger at the water dispenser on the fridge so it dispensed nothing but homemade french vanilla whipped cream.

As the girls tumbled down the stairs in more orderly fashion, Steve appeared in the back door, framed by the light of early morning peeking through the trees along the garden’s edge. With little patience for Steve and the eyes he had only for Darcy, Bucky came up behind and gave Steve a shove.

“There’s coffee on, punk. Move it or lose it.” Bucky elbowed past with the morning paper tucked under one arm. He bussed Wanda and the girls on the cheek as he made his way to the coffee pot to the tune of a chorus of “Good morning, Uncle Bucky”s.

“Move it or lose what?” Steve leaned around Darcy to call after his best friend.

Bucky pointed at him, casting a glance at the girls, then Darcy, and pointed even harder with a scowl because he knew just what Darcy would have to say if he finished that thought out loud in front of the girls. “ _You know_ , good for nothin’, punk outta Brooklyn,” he muttered, trailing off, as he stuck a water glass into the fridge dispenser, “marries better than he ever ought’a and suddenly a fella’s surrounded by heaps a’the fairer sex and all these little ears—” He sputtered to a stop, though, when the fridge spit out french vanilla whipped cream. For a second, he looked like he might whine, but thought better of it, finished filling his glass and got a spoon before heading to the table to shut up and eat his sugar like a good boy.

“Did you lose Aunt Fran and Aunt Jet?” Darcy asked her husband, rising on tiptoe to press a kiss to his sweaty cheek.

“Hell, no,” Bucky scoffed, snapping the paper open. “They conjured up an off-road golf cart somehow; been out there behind us the whole way, calling out encouraging comments and the like about Stevie’s real fine runnin' form and my rear end. They’re probably out on the patio, cackling like hens in a henhouse over the pictures they took.”

“Pictures?” Steve popped up to look over Darcy’s head at the troublemaker spooning up another mouthful of whipped cream at the table over the funny pages.

“Never you mind,” Bucky waved him off. “Keeps ‘em outta trouble. If they ain’t takin’ the Instagram pictures a’your butt, they’re fixing to cast some spell or other to make mine irresistible to all the single ladies and fellas in town. Can’t go inta the Hannaford’s these days without some well-meanin’ lady or fella gropin’ my produce and givin' me the Eye.” His lips twisted. “I got bruises on top a’bruises tryin’ ta pick up that watermelon for your Labor Day do. Couldn’t pay me to do the grocery shop again anytime soon,” he griped, stopping only to chug and scoop a second glassful of whipped cream Wanda set beside his paper.

Darcy snorted and returned to the waffle maker to take the blueberries Wanda pulled for her next from the basket by the back door.

“Aw, not blueberries…” Autumn whined until Wanda waved the bag of dark chocolate chips under her nose. “Oh.”

“Autumn ate a whole bag of those last night. How come she gets more for breakfast?” Amber tattled this time.

“Did not!”

“Did too!” They faced off. “Just because you conjured a clone of the bag instead of taking the original bag from the kitchen doesn’t mean you didn’t _eat_ them.”

“That was supposed to be a secret!” Autumn stomped her foot and raised a threatening finger at her sister.

“There was chocolate on your forehead and in your hair when you woke up,” Darcy reminded her furious brunette child.

“Oh.”

“Yeah, ‘oh’.” Darcy sighed. “And don’t point unless you mean to cast, it’s bad manners.” She laid a hand over her daughter’s finger until Autumn looked at her mother with apologetic eyes. “You can do more damage than you know and people aren’t always understanding when you miss. Be mindful, but not fearful, okay?” Darcy cupped her baby’s chin.

“Yes, Mommy.” Autumn curled her fingers into her palms. “I wouldn’t have hurt anybody. I was just gonna give her an itch in her pants all day.”

Darcy gave her a _look_.

“Not the whole day. Just the school part,” she muttered defiantly.

“It’s the first day and everyone’s wound up; I know.” Darcy smoothed Autumn’s hair back from her face. “And there’s a ton of caffeine in dark chocolate, so I bet you were up late, huh?”

Autumn looked anywhere but at her mother.

“Oh, honey.” Darcy knelt down at her daughter’s height. “I’m not mad. Besides, I know the aunts would only sneak it into your bag for lunch if I put my foot down now, so we’ll make a deal—no more sneaking candy after bedtime on school nights and I’ll look the other way when the aunts make cake for breakfast on weekends when school is in session.”

“Really?” Autumn’s hazel eyes shone brightly, unable to believe her good luck.

“Of course, darling,” Aunt Jet assured her niece, drifting in from the garden with a basket of fresh blood oranges over her arm, picked from an Everyfruit tree Darcy’s Aunt Sally enchanted to pick up some of the garden’s slack with two super soldiers in the house. The blueberry bushes just couldn’t keep up with super soldier consumption in season. “But as you know, in this house, we _always_ have chocolate cake for breakfast, not just on weekends. And we never bother with silly things like bedtimes or brushing our teeth.”

“Aunt Jet...” Darcy warned.

Jet turned her devilish smile on Darcy as a ten-layer chocolate cake appeared on a platter in the middle of the breakfast table out of thin air. (Bucky sucked in a sharp, happy exclamation.) “Why don’t you go finish getting ready, darling? Fran and I can take care of the rest. And Sally will be here any minute. Your mother, too. It’s a big day. I’m sure she’ll want to help with breakfast.”

“'Feed them their weight in chocolate', you mean,” Darcy muttered, knowing a lost cause when she saw it. She took her aunt’s offer, though, knowing she’d have little enough time to make herself decent for drop-off if someone else didn’t finish making the waffles in her place.

“I’ve got it,” Wanda promised as Darcy sighed and trudged toward the stairs.

She brightened considerably at the sound of Aunt Fran sneaking up behind Bucky and scaring twenty years off his life with what could only have been a firm pat to his rear end. Her laughter tinkled brightly in the stairwell as Darcy laughed along with her, dancing lightly up the stairs.

When she emerged from the shower twenty minutes later, pink and fresh, and feeling a little lightheaded from the steam, Steve sat on their bed, waiting for her with a foot propped up on the iron bed rail at the end. He stared at his bare toes, wiggling them until it piqued her curiosity.

“Someone turned my toenails sparkly red while I slept last night. I’m not sure if it’s a prank or one of those accidental things the girls sometimes do when they’re dreaming,” he said with a resigned sigh.

“They’ll outgrow it,” Darcy assured her mate. “Mostly. Probably,” she amended.

Then she got a good look at his toes.

“Have you checked Bucky’s pockets?” she asked, tongue in cheek.

“Why?” Steve sat up, leaning forward to look closer at his toes.

“That is Ruby Slipper Red. I’d know that shade anywhere. Nat gave me that nail polish, Barnes!” she bellowed, knowing he’d hear her no matter where he scuttled off to in the house to hide.

“Uncle Bucky says it could’a been pixies!” Amber called back.

“Or elves!” Autumn added helpfully.

“Or no account skirt-chasers from Brooklyn, too, I guess!” Steve hollered back.

“I don’t chase _only_ skirts!” Bucky shouted, giving away his location like a dope. Steve was out the door and over the railing in a flash. Darcy snickered when two pairs of feet pounded down the stairwell and out the front door, the shouting surely carrying through the woods to her cousin Kylie’s place down the path. When she looked out the window, Darcy caught a flash of red streak through the woods, followed hot on its heels by a flash of blue. Treetops wavered and birds scattered.

“Breakfast is ready!” Aunt Jet called, and by the time Darcy reached the kitchen, it was full to the brim with Owenses. Kylie’s oldest, Poppy, bounced in her seat with the nervous energy of all kindergartners, shoveling bits of waffle and orange into her mouth with her bare hands while her little sister ignored breakfast altogether in favor of squatting on the table to scribble on a paper bag with half-spent candles. Darcy’s mom, Gillian, occupied one side of the kitchen island, pouring cups of milk and coffee, while Aunt Sally took up a spot on the other side, piling up steaming waffles and peeling oranges with an absent flick of her fingers. Wanda lifted each plate as it filled, pushing it in the direction of the table with a burst of red energy.

From the woods, Steve emerged draped over Bucky’s shoulder like a sack of potatoes, laughing. Somehow, they both seemed to have a headlock on the other.

“Oh,” Kylie exhaled, pressing a hand to her belly as she paused by Darcy’s side, watching the men carry on up the path to the house.

“He’s not seeing anyone,” Darcy muttered out of the side of her mouth when Kylie’s hands fisted in the hem of her blouse at the sight of Bucky losing his shirt when he put Steve down and Steve made a grab for him, yanking the shirt over the jerk’s head. “And the aunts are already interfering,” she whispered conspiratorially. “Better Bucky than you and Antonia, though, am I right?”

“Yeah… Uh huh…” Kylie breathed, mesmerized.

“And he knows the curse is broken, so it’s not like he’s a nervous local, who’d bolt like Dwight did at the first loud chirp of a beetle,” Darcy twisted the screws a little. “He can take care of himself, anyway. I mean, obviously.” She gestured outside to Bucky, who somehow managed to rip Steve’s shirt right off his body, the blue cotton hanging in tatters from a shiny metal fist. They stood there, panting and sweating, and laughing, covered in smudges of dirt and clinging bits of the forest floor.

“Goodness,” Aunt Sally breathed, pupils dilating in response to the display of rippling muscles as the other women crowded around to watch, too. “Tonia will be so sad she missed this.”

“College first,” Darcy murmured, bringing her coffee to her lips to sip and enjoy the view without a whiff of guilt. She knew she married pretty. The best part of her day sometimes were these totally unselfconscious moments between Steve and Bucky.

They had no idea how hot they are.

Darcy was the very last person who’d be pointing that out and ruining a perfectly good thing for everyone.

“Are you sure you have to go back so soon?” Aunt Fran asked, laying a hand on Darcy’s shoulder.

“You’re going to miss the eye candy that much?” Darcy teased.

“Oh, you,” Aunt Jet swatted at her. “Not that we won’t miss the gun show every morning, but … you’re all so much happier here than when we’ve come to visit you at the compound. You know you don’t have to work. There’s nothing we can’t conjure up here with a wish. Or anywhere, really.”

“No, I know, Aunt Jet.” Darcy set aside her coffee to hug her aunt. “Steve has a very strong sense of responsibility to live up to the promise he made to Dr. Erskine. If he walked away, I think he’d feel like he failed.”

“Darcy...” Aunt Fran sighed. “You know how sorry we are we couldn’t save him. It would have changed the course of the war.”

“I know.” And she also knew 'him' referred to more than one man they regretted not being able to save. Darcy turned her attention back to the yard where Steve stood with his hands on his hips, eyes trained on the ground. Bucky met her eyes over Steve’s shoulder and she cursed. “Dammit.”

“What?” the aunts demanded as Darcy darted outside.

“He heard you,” she hissed, slamming open the door with more magical force than she intended. She paused at the top of the porch steps. “Steve…?”

“Don’t,” he panted, refusing to turn and look at her.

“I only found out myself recently,” she explained. “There are some things we can’t change—can’t even risk interfering. Think, honey. If they stepped in to save Erskine, the Hydra agent could have shot Peggy, or you, or Howard,” she reasoned.

“Yeah,” he agreed, taking deep, angry breaths and trying to collect himself. “Did they know about the rest? About Bucky?”

“I don’t know,” she confessed. “And there are some questions I know they’ll answer honestly that I really don’t want answers to, so sometimes I don’t ask them.” She cast an apologetic glance at Bucky. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s fate,” Bucky said in response, more to Steve than Darcy. “We’re Irish enough to know a little about fate, punk. Fate’ll have its due, whether you step in or not, yeah?” He turned and posed the question to Darcy as the last few words passed his lips.

She nodded.

“The plane, too?” Steve’s voice rasped and she finally understood why he refused to look at her.

Her lip wobbled. “I don’t kn—”

“Yes,” Aunt Fran cut her off. “We knew you were needed, that you alone would change the course of the war.” She joined hands with Jet. “Our hands were tied.”

“We did what we could to keep you safe until the equipment and technology existed to find you and bring you home, Steven,” Jet said firmly. “To your family.”

Darcy stepped cautiously down the stairs, giving Steve plenty of room as she circled him to stand beside Bucky, who promptly wrapped his metal arm around her in a half-hug of forgiveness.

“Erskine gave the Allies the win they needed. He did his part,” Bucky stated with conviction. “And we did ours.”

“Yeah.” Steve finally glanced up at Darcy with splotchy, red eyes.

“Oh, honey.” Her breath caught.

Bucky gave her a gentle shove. “Go on, doll. Take your fella upstairs to clean up. Me and your ma can take the girls to school.”

Darcy blinked and realized she was near tears, too. “Pictures,” she croaked.

Aunt Fran snapped her fingers, conjuring an old fashioned camera as she summoned the girls. “Time for pictures!” she called.

The older girls tumbled outside and down the stairs like a pile of clumsy kittens, covered in chocolate and sticky with blood orange juice. Wanda rolled her eyes and herded the kindergartners to a spot near the rosemary by the garden gate.

“Cheese!” all four girls cried as one, smiling big for the camera, even Wanda. Then there was a mad scramble to down the rest of their waffles and grab backpacks and a final worry over packing or conjuring lunch, and the girls were gone, stepping through a portal to the coven school between Darcy’s mom and Aunt Sally, with Bucky and Kylie pulling up the rear, with her youngest, Hazel, perched on her hip.

“Steve?” Darcy checked on her husband’s state of mind with the lightest mental touch. His thoughts had turned to the cliffs and the cold waters of the Atlantic pounding against the shore.

“Steven.” Aunt Fran’s voice was quiet, apologetic. “We’ll answer any questions you want to ask, but you may not like the answers. There’s sorrow in some kinds of knowledge. It’s … not always a blessing, _knowing_.”

He nodded. “I understand.”

“We did everything we could without changing the direction of your path, sweetheart,” Jet swore. “We made it as much like sleep as we could, muted the pain when it became unbearable.” She breathed deep and exhaled. “We couldn’t stop the dreams. They gave you hope.”

Steve shook his head. “Dreams? Or hallucinations?”

Fran’s lip quivered.

“I dreamed of Darcy, when I was under. I dreamed of her and I thought ‘that can’t be right, that’s not what Peggy looks like’. I dreamed of Darcy for _years_ , spoke to her, built sandcastles in dreams…” he trailed off. “On the beach here. We built sandcastles right here in those dreams.”

“We felt you, your spirit wandering,” Jet said with certainty. Fran and Jet’s fingers tightened together. “On the beach sometimes, or here at the house. You drifted in and out. We stayed close to keep you company and so you wouldn't drift any farther from yourself. You needed an anchor, darling.”

“That’s why your scrapbooks stopped just before the end of the war,” Darcy whispered. “You came home to mind Steve’s wandering spirit?”

“Steven’s plane landed closer to the house than it did to London.” Fran drifted closer to run a hand down Darcy’s arm. “When fate pulled the strings to bring you two together, we came home. Steven needed us. You both did.”

Steve’s eyes watered and his chin wobbled.

Jet approached him with caution. “We couldn’t save Erskine, Steven, but that was written in the fabric of fate long before we arrived. Yours only unfolded moments ahead of us until the plane went down. We knew you were important, but not how important to our family until that moment.”

“You ... sat with me?” Steve’s gaze turned inward, his eyes glassy.

“Whenever you became restless, yes, we kept you company. We tried not to interfere any more than necessary. The dreams gave you hope, a reason to live, and tethered your spirit to this plane.” Jet took a chance and stepped into his space, curling both arms around his waist and her face into his chest. “We loved you when you were only the _idea_ of you, sweetheart. You were an Owens long before you met Darcy. James, too.”

“Kylie?” Darcy asked with a sly smile, sniffling as the aunts deftly turned the subject to less upsetting topics.

Fran said nothing, but _her_ smile said plenty all on its own.

“Dwight never would have worked out,” Jet sniffed, disdain written plainly on her features.

“You ran him off, right? The constant beetle chirping?” Darcy knew how her aunts worked.

“He teased her without mercy when she was little. She gave him chickenpox once, the little twerp.” Jet huffed. “No less than he deserved.”

“His bags were already packed when we hid the beetle in his truck,” Fran admitted. “He was going to abandon Kylie and the girls no matter what. We only hastened the inevitable.”

“Sally cast a spell with the village coven that had his boots burping toads for a month after he left,” Jet confessed with a reluctant cackle, slapping a hand over her mouth to cut it off.

“Bucky and Kylie?” Steve finally broke from his sad reverie, with something to focus on other than his own fate.

“It’s one possibility,” Fran confirmed, “but we’ve been testing the waters lately to see if he’ll hold up, so to speak,” she said firmly, with a wink and not a hint of remorse.

“It’ll take a lot more than a month of toad-burping combat boots to run Buck off of a pretty redhead with a good set a’pins,” Steve snorted.


	3. New Magic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Emotional. Magical. Bathtub. Sex. 
> 
> That's it. That's the summary.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Describing abstract intangible things created to symbolize abstract, intangible _other_ things is a trip. Not sure I’d recommend. XD Also: please note that I made a small edit to last chapter. It’s really only going to matter if I write a sequel, though, so don’t feel like it’s critical to go back and reread to enjoy this update.
> 
> Many thanks to Zephrbabe for helping me write my way out of a corner. This chapter is unbeta'd. All mistakes are on me and Autocorrect because I edited on my phone in bed this morning.
> 
> Suggested listening: A Warm Place by NIN

 

“You two go on upstairs and freshen up. We’ll clear up breakfast,” Aunt Fran dismissed them easily while Steve seemed willing to be distracted long enough to take their discussion somewhere more private.

“I’m so sorry, Steve,” Darcy repeated quietly as they climbed the stairs. Usually, this is when she’d lay her head on his shoulder and siphon off his endless wells of comfort and strength, but she knew Steve needed space to process right now. Space and time.

She’d give him anything he needed.

Everything.

By her side, her husband’s breath hitched and his eyelashes dusted his cheeks as he glanced away. “If Buck’s okay with it, I don’t have much room to kick up a fuss, you know?” He swallowed, hard. “I mean to say … I _understand_ , but could we _not_ do this right now?” He paused mid-step, gripping the banister until it creaked under the force of his fingers, and took a resetting breath.

“But you don’t have to _understand_ , honey.” Darcy ran her hand from his elbow up the back of his arm to his shoulder in soothing repetition. “You’re entitled to your anger, and it’s _my_ fault anyway. I was hoping there’d be a right time—a _better_ time to tell you—”

“No, it’s not—” He shook his head. Sliding a hand down to hover over the small of her back, he guided her up the final stairway, waiting until the door to their bedroom closed behind them before closing his eyes to slump against it and admit, “For one ... _terrible_ second—not even a whole second—I could have had everything I once wanted, and in wishing for it, Darce, gleefully would have tossed away everything that matters to me now. You, the girls—” His breath hitched and tears pooled on the precipice of his lashes. “I’m just not ready to unpack what it means that I _wanted_ that, even for a split second, doll. Because I don’t. I don’t want that, not now, not ever.” He sniffed and buried his head in his hands as he slid to the floor.

“Oh, honey...” Shocked, hurt tears spilled over against her will. She sucked it up just as quickly and exhaled, then reminded him (and herself, too) gently, “You know you don’t have to be the perfect captain with me all the time, Steve. It’s _okay_ to be imperfect in your thoughts. No one expects more fro—”

“Please, don’t,” he begged, his voice shaking with unshed tears. A dust bunny stirred across the floor from under the bed, sticking to his sweaty ankle.

“Let’s get you cleaned up for now, okay? Let's just ... one thing a time. Everything feels better when you're clean and dry.” Darcy sniffed and sat back on her heels, mentally filing away the plans she made to sit her husband down and have a much-needed, serious talk with him today. It could wait.

Everything could wait while Steve was hurting.

“I’ll run you a bath,” she murmured. Shuffling as close as she dared, she ran a hand through the hair over his ear, scratching at his neck.

“ ‘kay,” he sniffed, swiping a hand under his nose.

“Be ready in a minute,” she promised.

In reality, it would have taken ten or twenty, but Darcy applied a touch of magic and folded time (just a little) to move things along so Steve had less time to stew on his own. Into the tub, she poured more than just hot water and a few herbs. Unconditional love, understanding, and forgiveness went in next, followed by an abundance of comfort and solace, reassurance, and a pinch of good cheer. She swirled the magical additions into the water with one hand and laid the other against the side of the tub to warm it all to a comfortable, soothing temperature Steve would enjoy.

Leave it to him to find the good cheer first, though, when he lowered himself into the bath with a chuckle for the trio of Avengers rubber duckies Darcy set bobbing on the surface with a gentle push of magical intention to send them off in random patterns, stirring up bubbles, herbs, and magic in their wake.

“Be honest,” Steve demanded with a wry smile, twirling a finger in the little eddies of blue and gold and green magic twining together on the surface. “How much magic did you pour into this tub while I sat out there feeling sorry for myself?”

“All of it,” she admitted readily without an ounce of guilt. His sad smile in return only served to break her heart that much more. She leaned across his shoulders to grab a cloth, kissing the sloping curve of his biceps on the return trip. He sighed and laid back his head, inviting more kisses with an indulgent pucker of lips.

“Mmm…” he hummed, glowing gently with each of the additions Darcy slipped into his bath suffusing him one after the other. He lit up, golden and god-like, as she worked to massage her gifts under his skin and the lingering tension suspended between them slipped away.

“It’s a lot,” he sighed. “Your love. There’s so much. A whole tub full of it,” he murmured, eyes drifting shut.

“Silly,” she returned with a sad smile of her own, pushing up her sleeves. She cradled the nape of his neck. “All my love for you wouldn’t fit in this tiny bathtub.”

“How big?” he demanded softly, sinking until water and magic lapped at his upper lip, forcing out the final word in a bubble beneath the surface.

“A swimming pool, at least,” she insisted, rubbing more ease and comfort into the tense muscles surrounding his ribs. For good measure, she threw in a little more lassitude and another drop of good humor.

“Olympic?” he hummed, twitching when her fingers drifted over his ticklish spots, checking the results of her work.

“Bigger,” she corrected with a thoughtful hum. “A lake, at least.”

“Like the one in Central Park?” he wondered. “Or one of those big glacier lakes with all the, the … the boats?” He blinked to stay awake, belatedly realizing he’d spoken half-under water, but Darcy got the gist.

She shook her head. “Uhn-uh.”

“No?” he frowned, petulant and annoyed with her in the best possible way.

“An ocean, Steve,” Darcy crooned, lifting a hand to run more tenderness and safekeeping through his wet hair. “My love for you needs plenty of room,” she insisted, funneling even more of her sky blue love and cotton candy clouds of succor into his bath, “because it’s not done growing yet.”

“Okay,” he sighed, pushing his cheek into her palm and opening himself to her final gift: forgiveness, every ounce she could muster. She poured it into him and topped off the bath, forcing it even into the places where only a bit of the bathwater remained, buckets and _buckets_ of forgiveness, more than enough for both of them. Then, removing her clothes, she scrambled over the edge of the tub to join him. “Hey,” he caught her with a dopey grin, tightening his hold and welcoming her to his lap. “We’ll get in trouble if we make a mess.”

“That’s what magic’s for, silly.” Darcy laid her head on his chest as he readjusted, sitting up a little straighter to tuck her head under his chin.

“You’re naked,” he pointed out helpfully.

“That’s how baths work, Steve,” she reminded him with a laugh as his hands closed over her middle. A wandering hand slid up her front. Fingers explored her nipples, tugging gently until they stiffened at the attention. Her breath caught and desire coiled in her belly.

“Can’t have you in here. ‘s not safe.” His brow furrowed adorably as he tried to remember the warnings he’d been given early on in their marriage and again when she was expecting the twins. “You’ll get infe’tion,” he slurred, enchantment-drunk and drowsy with the heat of the bath.

“Steven, this tub might have about three drops of water left in it,” she pointed out with an indulgent smile for his muzzied brain. “The rest is magic. We can totally have sex in magic.”

“Oh, good,” he said, lifting her easily by the waist and sliding her down over his thickening length.

“Steve!” she gasped, panting as her body suddenly stretched to accommodate him. (Steve wasn’t exactly _average_ in any way.)

“We ever…?” He shook his head, trying to clear it a little of the drowsy touch of Darcy's magic filling him with succor and rest. “We ever done this before?”

“Hmm? What?” she asked, lost in the feel of him, his heat and strength, circling her hips and lowering herself until her ass bumped his hip bones.

“We ever … ever _fucked_ in your magic before?” he spelled out artlessly, groaning. He threw his head back and Darcy twisted to lick at his bobbing Adam’s apple.

“Nuh uh,” she panted, planting one last kiss to his throat, rising and falling as he lifted her, easily moving her exactly as he wanted. She went limp in his arms, just hung on for dear life with a hand hooked around the back of his neck, giving herself over to the feel of his rising desire and pecking little kisses everywhere she could reach beneath his jaw, so many kisses she lost track.

The level of the tub began to rise even higher as something strong and sure surged and joined Darcy’s magic, lapping away from them in chaotic circles.

_Steve’s love._

(And Steve was Irish, to be sure, with his own little touch of Fae to protect a warrior in battle [or a VitaRay chamber]. He’d never used that touch of magic deliberately like this before, though feeling it was easier than ever once Darcy showed him the shape and texture of the magic he came in contact with every day.)

The tub overflowed with Steve’s love, rising to the surface, bubbling rich and deep blue, shimmering with starstuff in little flecks of gold and silver and something in between. His love surrounded and filled her, too.

“Oh, Steve,” Darcy wept at the depth of his love and devotion, soaking up his gift in return. She marveled at how someone with so little could fill the space with his magic, and more, she realized with a laugh as it didn’t just spill over the edges, but flooded the room, cascading into nooks and crannies, surging against the walls and door, and climbing half up the wainscoting. Blue eddies and swirls of more starstuff twisted in every direction, and Steve’s hand closed over her mound.

“Love you, Darce. Love you, love you, love you,” he chanted, wrapping her up in his strength and constancy, He pumped his hips in short, purposeful bursts, pulling her down on himself again and again and again.

His fingers circled her clit, _a promise_.

He had more love left to give, to push under her skin and into her heart and mind when she was ready.

She had only to say the word.

The  _words_.

“I love you,” she sobbed, head tilted back, body bowed in petition, a litany and prayer. His fingers closed on her clit and Darcy exploded, a supernova born among the stars in the space between their racing heartbeats.

The walls creaked with the ensuing deluge, their love’s magic filling the room to bursting.

“Steve!” Darcy cried, swept away on it, on him, swept up and carried away in a tidal wave of love.

“Darcy!” he shouted as their magic swelled, blotting out even the warm, autumn sunlight for a moment, and Darcy fell away into the enveloping dark blue, swathed in more starstuff and ringed in shimmering specks of something new.

Devotion and sanctuary and passion, all rolled into one.

It glimmered amongst the darkness, winking the same depthless blue shade as the love of her husband that suspended and held it fast.

She’d never seen magic like it, she thought as she drifted, lifting a lazy hand to swirl through this newest layer of their bond.

Afterward, when the tangible proof of their magic ebbed and slipped between cracks to suffuse her family’s home, and they toweled off enough to curl up in the lingering wisps of a whole new magic clinging to the bedclothes, Steve turned to gaze at her. His eyes swirled with dark blue and starstuff and _more_.

“I understand,” he uttered with finality, finding one last, little reserve and pushing _peace_ through the strong fingers cradling her jaw as his lips closed over hers in a kiss.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *puppy-wriggles*
> 
> THEY MADE UP. \o/ THEY'RE OKAY! 
> 
> Time for Darcy to tell Steve her good news next...? Any idea what it could be?


	4. An Owens Omen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short little chapter, but I think you’ll like it. ;-)

 

Elsewhere in the house, Fran sighed happily as a shiny new magic wound its way into the tapestry of the Owens’ family legacy. With a hum of satisfaction, she wove in the magic’s ends for safekeeping.

Never far from her sister, Jet tidied up the kitchen with a flick of her wrist and a quick incantation to deal with pesky chocolate sauce fingerprints. As she worked, a grasshopper alighted on the windowsill between two potted herbs. Jet held out a hand and gladly the grasshopper climbed into it.

“I know just the place for you,” she said, carrying him to the library and offering him a spot in the soft green moss of a terrarium atop a low bookshelf filled to bursting with family albums, scrapbooks, and mementos.

For the grasshopper’s part, it rubbed its hindleg against a wing and settled in to wait.

“Good news is coming,” the aunts agreed.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [More animal omens](https://exemplore.com/spirit-animals/Omens-Oracles-And-Signs-Are-You-Superstitious), good and bad, you might enjoy reading about. (Chapter has been edited after it was posted because there's no damn window over the sink in the Owens' kitchen! Argh! My bad!)


	5. A Blessing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve and Darcy find out just what kind of magic they're capable of making together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is unbeta'd because I just finished my final edit on it, like, a minute ago and wanted to post it ASAP because I was too excited not to post the last chapter the second I had it done. Enjoy!!!
> 
> Suggested listening: “Practical Magic” and “Amas Veritas” by Alan Silvestri, and "Beyond the Sea" by Bobby Darin

“The aunts invited us again to move here, to move home,” Darcy announced hours later as they lay in one another’s arms—not sleeping, but no more than that, either. Just holding on and running hands over one another, basking in the long-lasting afterglow of heady emotional magics.

Darcy thought he should know. They had a choice.

 _Steve_ had a choice.

About a lot of things she’d put off too long, really.

“Is that what you’ve been working up to all morning?” he rasped, his voice rough and unaccustomed to speech after so long spent in silence, enjoying the closeness and quiet with most of the family out for the morning.

“No—yes,” Darcy immediately corrected, then sighed. “I got a job offer, a promotion, really.”

Steve’s lazy smile turned to one of delight. “That’s great, doll. I know how frustrating it’s been for you, stuck running the labs part-time and lending Hill a hand with admin minutiae when you have so much more to offer the Initiative. I take it the video conference with Pepper went well on Thursday?”

Darcy sighed again and scootched closer to twine her leg around her husband’s. “It did, but mostly because Bruce got promoted, too. He’ll be running the labs with a quartet of assistants for the legwork so he doesn’t have to give up his own lab time and he’s delighted with the change, so how come now that I have exactly what I thought I _wanted_ , it feels like the last thing I _need_?”

“How so?” Steve asked, lifting a hand to push a curl behind her ear.

“Pepper created a new position for me—head of Political Affairs for the Avengers Initiative. It’s tailor-made for me, honestly. Pepper wants to take advantage of having someone in-house with the authority of a PhD behind their name who won’t abuse the position for their own ends, and five years ago, I would have given _anything_ for it, but now...”

“Now?” her husband prompted. Steve sat up and pulled her up under his arm when she sat in silence, gathering her thoughts. “Five years ago, how did you see yourself using your degrees? PhDs in Sociology: Crime and Conflict, and Social Psychology with Special Interest in Peace and Violence seem … pretty specific…” He trailed off with a wry smile.

Darcy felt her breath catch and she fiddled with the top sheet covering them to the waist. He wasn’t wrong. It was just… She’d grown— _matured_ so much in those five years and things had changed—the Avengers nearly torn apart time and again by supposed ‘international cooperation’. And Darcy’s rose-colored glasses were shattered.

“I still thought I could save the world, do something better for it, something _without_ magic.”

“Saving the world isn’t always done in grand gestures the bards will write songs about like they do on Asgard,” Steve reminded her gently, turning deeper into her embrace and tracing circles in lazy patterns on the back of her shoulder. “Sometimes, it’s a horrible, muddy slog through mud and an uphill grind over loose terrain that feels like three steps back for every one forward.”

“You’d know better than most,” Darcy conceded, tucking her head under his chin and speaking into his clavicle so he wouldn’t see the doubt in her eyes, the suspicion that the problem was her, that _she_ wasn’t enough. “Is it enough, though? Will it ever be?” she asked instead.

“No way to know, so we just do our best and hope it makes a difference for the people who don’t get a say in it like we do, the ones who don’t know how to affect change.” His lips felt warm when they pressed to the top of her head. “Something else is bothering you. What has you thinking so hard about moving back home? Be honest, doll.”

“I had a meeting with the team running setup for the foundation you and Bucky have been trying to get off the ground the last few years. I can’t tell if they’re dragging their feet on purpose or just really inept, but most of them need to go. There’s no progress; every meeting is a running list of excuses about why each bullet point covered at the last meeting hasn’t been ticked off the list since. I think, if we want it done, we need to use people who are personally invested in seeing it through. Friends, family.”

“Who’d you have in mind?” Steve asked, trusting her take on the situation without reservation.

“Kylie’s talent is going to waste working for her mom, running her website and managing a half dozen bath and body stores on the mainland. Aunt Sally would forgive me for poaching her for something this important.” At least, she thought so.

“Kylie?” Steve raised an eyebrow, but she was glad when his brow furrowed, obviously giving her first pick some serious consideration.

“She’s got an M.B.A., Steve. What is she even still doing on this island? Dwight wanted to stay here, but Kylie always wanted to see the world, to make her mark on it. Through the foundation, she could.”

“But her girls…”

“She’s a witch; she can have it all if she wants, even commute home every night. It's a quick traveler incantation.”

“Fair enough,” he conceded.

“And Antonia’s been making noise about going into Urban Planning for her graduate work next year.”

“I thought she was interested in social work?”

“Urban Planning is an extension of social work,” she explained, working up a little excitement now at the thought of seriously putting together her own team for the Sarah-Winnifred Foundation, rather than using a handful of people Pepper's aids gathered up more than two years ago with little to show for their efforts after all this time. Darcy could do real good in the world through the foundation, put time and resources where she and Steve and Bucky thought they'd do the most good. “And Bucky’s got a great-niece who still lives in Brooklyn with a background in Public Policy. She’s worked for several key New York democrats over the last decade and had a hand in organizing the board for that Brooklyn LGBTQIA+ charity we attend holiday fundraisers for every December. She’d be an ideal pick for a project like this, and she comes with her own network of non-profit-interested parties to help us get off the ground.”

“You’ve given this a lot of thought.” Steve paused mid-lazy circle and pressed her close with the hand on her shoulder blade.

“I’ve been thinking a lot about family lately, about … about spending more time with the girls and how quickly they’re growing. I feel like I’m missing things and at the same time, wondering why I’m working toward someone else’s goals when our family has this huge project just sitting on the back burner, waiting for someone to take hold of it and make it real. As much as I want to make _your_ job easier, I think there are other people who could do that, too, but the foundation…”

“It’s ours,” Steve agreed. “It _should_ be a family thing; I think you’re right. No one else has the passion for it like we do.”

“I’d have to leave the Avengers Initiative, too, Steve.” She hated this part, but maybe it was time to rip off the bandaid. “Pepper’s got all these up and coming junior execs itching to get their hands in all her side projects to show what they're made of. They want to impress her and stand out on the world stage. The Initiative is a great platform for some of the folks working for her with an eye toward civil service. I want to devote my time to our girls while they’re still young and the foundation, while it’s still in the early stages, while we’re still deciding what it will be and the impact it will make.”

“And coming home is important to do that?”

“Consider it a strategic retreat. We’ll organize at the kitchen table if we have to for now, but I'm ready for a more family-centered life, even if that means we're not working in the same building anymore or living on site. Then, when we’re ready, we’ll find a _better_ strategic location for the foundation, D.C., maybe, with a west coast office in San Francisco or L.A. or Seattle. Hell if I know.” She grinned at her big, beautiful husband. “But I want a solid base for the girls—a home to call their own rather than a Tony Stark-proof condo with sterile grey-on-grey-on-white decor and no heart and soul, and no hearth. We're witches, Steve. We _need_ a fire to set our cauldron over and grass under our feet, a garden gate to plant our rosemary beside, and lavender, too, for luck.”

Steve inhaled and exhaled slowly, his lips tipping up in a smile. “I’m glad to know we’re on the same page.”

“What?” She twisted and sat up straight in his arms.

“Barton’s been making noise about retiring from fieldwork to train the newcomers full time. He’d still be available for the big emergencies, but leave the more dangerous daily fieldwork to the junior and senior agents. In fact, most of Alpha Team is taking a step back in one way or another. Bucky and Sam have already started taking on more of the in-house senior agent training and skill-building work from Hill to free her up for full time administrative work. Thor’s made clear he’s on-call for big emergencies, but agency fieldwork isn’t his calling and he knows it. It sounds like Bruce is needed in the lab and Tony’s got some idea about a college lecture and recruiting tour. He’d be available, but only as a final call out in a world-wide emergency. He’s feeling his age more and more after some of these fights and I can’t begrudge him that. I’m a little … worn out myself.”

“Oh, Steve…” Darcy cupped his cheek, pressing her lips to his, then her forehead, sharing breath for a minute before she asked the million dollar question: “Why didn’t you say so sooner?”

“Duty? Loyalty? ...Guilt?” He grimaced and lifted the shoulder of his free arm in a half-shrug. “Pick one, I guess.”

“You gave the world— _humanity—_ your whole life in nineteen-forty-five, baby. You don’t owe anyone any _more_ than that. You’ve already given them everything,” Darcy swore.

He swallowed and admitted quietly, “I know.”

“Do you?” Darcy pressed.

He bit his lips and nodded, but wouldn’t meet her eyes. She saw the telltale redness in his, though, the glassiness of suppressed emotion.

“You don’t have to give up the shield, but you could set it aside a while, like the others. Take a step back, let Hill run the Initiative. Hell, Nat’s badass enough; she could handle the responsibility of the shield and you never have to wonder where loyalties lie with her. She’s family, like Bucky, like Clint and Sam. She’d do you proud just because you asked her to mind the shield, honey.”

“You think?” He paused to reflect on that a moment. “I always thought Peggy would’a made a better Cap than me, you know. She was so fierce and determined, and she walked like a tank that would just roll right up and over you when she had her mind set and you got in the way of it. Nat’s always reminded me of her that way. It’s a lot to ask just so I could take an extended leave of absence, though…”

Darcy bit her lip and held her breath.

“Big changes,” Steve mused, swallowing audibly. “Lots to think about.”

“There’s…” Darcy paused, unsure if she should press forward or let things stand where they were without adding any other big things to their shared plate.

“Something else?” Steve grinned, sliding his arm down low across her back and pressing his free hand to her belly with a knowing smile. “I thought there might be.”

“You knew,” she breathed, laying a hand over his.

“Strongly suspected,” he admitted. “But I thought there was an Owens thing—that we’d only ever have the two girls—so I didn’t want to get my hopes up if I was reading the situation wrong.” He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. “Your scent’s already changed.”

“Wh…?” Darcy blinked in shock. “Already?”

“It’s been a few hours and the magic still feels like it’s just under my skin, _knowing_ , telling me I’m right about this, but even if it wasn’t—” He tapped his nose. “Super soldier. I remember how your scent changed almost instantly last time, too. But you knew this was coming. You woke up with ‘something big is coming’ written all over your face this morning.”

It was Darcy’s turn to avoid _his_ eyes.

“Doll.” He tipped her chin up. “Tell the truth and shame the devil—did you peek?”

She swallowed hard and nodded. “I only meant to look at possible futures, depending on what I chose before the interview with Pepper and I stumbled across a path that led to—” She closed her eyes and exhaled. God, she wanted this, but her body shook with nerves. It was so big. She never imagined they could have this.

Opening her eyes, she lifted a hand wrapped in wisps of possibilities and fate and time, and asked, “Can I show you?”

“Please.” Steve leaned forward and Darcy covered his eyes.

When he opened them, they stood side-by-side on the beach, watching one of their possible futures play out as Darcy’s other self sat with her legs stretched wide, her feet touching Steve’s as he sat across from her in the sand in the same position with a strawberry blond baby boy swatting ineffectually at a small Cap-themed beach ball while their girls took advantage of their little brother’s preoccupation to make steady progress on a massive sandcastle.

Nearby, Hazel toddled up the beach, hand-in-hand with Bucky, picking shells and handing them up to him to store in the bulging cargo pockets of his board shorts for later. “Dat for Rowan, Da,” Hazel said, handing over their biggest find yet.

“Your baby cousin’s still pretty little. What’s he gonna do with a big shell like this?” Bucky asked.

Hazel turned it over in her hands a few times, then held it to her ear and smiled. She lifted it for Bucky to listen next, but when he did, he blinked in shock.

“Bucky?” Kylie called from farther down the beach. “Everything okay?”

Bucky glanced down at the little girl tugging on his hand. She grinned impishly back up at the soldier.

“Little witch.” He tweaked her nose with pride.

“What?” Kylie demanded as they came abreast of her and the others.

“Go ahead, listen,” Bucky insisted, handing over the large, conical shell. From this distance, Darcy and Steve could just make out the sound of one of the ocean-themed songs from Autumn’s favorite Disney movie. The others passed the musical shell around, praising Hazel for her magical addition to the pretty shell before putting it to baby Rowan’s ear and laughing with delight as his eyes widened in surprise and then joy as he recognized the song, too. He clapped and bounced, batting at his Cap ball and sending it flying—farther than any toddler his age should really be able to do.

“A little boy?” the Steve by her side murmured in disbelief. “I thought that wasn’t possible, Darce. More girls, maybe, but a boy...?”

“I didn’t think so, either,” Darcy was forced to admit, still in shock a little herself, “but this is where this path leads.”

“How? It’s been hundreds of years, right? How can this be? Why now?” Steve covered his mouth, staring down in wide-eyed wonder at himself playing with the impossible—a little Rogers-Owens boy with _his_  nose and his mother’s strawberry blond hair, and his pop’s pale, blue-green eyes.

“Magic doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It’s always growing, evolving, all our lives. We made a new magic, Steve. I know you felt it. We made a new magic this morning and this is _it_. Aunt Sally and Mom might have broken the curse, but we did something _else_. Something amazing. A blessing, I think.” She knelt in the sand, wishing she could reach out and hold this little miracle they’d made without even trying, without intent or purpose, just a gift and blessing fully formed and beautiful out of their love for one another.

The way all babies came to be, she supposed.

“There’s another,” she remembered, scrambling to her feet. “Earlier. We’ll need something warmer,” she said with a laugh, taking in the thin top sheet they’d brought along with them for cover in lieu of clothes. “It’s less disorienting with your eyes closed,” she promised when he protested her covering his eyes again and blotting out the beach scene before he’d drunk in all the little details.

When they opened their eyes, they found themselves in the woods outside a cozy cabin with a fire crackling merrily in its hearth, and visible through the front picture window alongside the hearth, a tiny, pale green-wrapped bundle in Darcy’s mother’s arms. On the lawn, their little family built snowmen, pausing to wave at Grandma Gilly inside with baby Rowan as Uncle Gary pulled Poppy around the yard in a sled. Aunt Sally snapped pics of Hazel and Wanda helping Bucky and Steve push the biggest ball for the bottom of their next snowman while Autumn and Amber pelted each other with snowballs guided by magic.

And though she couldn’t see them, Darcy felt the aunts not far—in the kitchen. She jumped there with Steve just in time to catch the end of a discussion about how long it would be until Darcy and Steve had ‘one more’.

“‘One more’ what?” Steve whispered for her ears alone.

“Another boy,” Darcy replied with certainty. Because while threes and thirteens were magic, of course, four could be magic, too. _Four_ felt just right to Darcy.

“Four…” Steve breathed. Then he blinked and his eyes sparkled with happy tears. “Four!” he whooped, sweeping Darcy off her feet.

“I can’t believe it. _We_ did this!” Darcy squealed, burying her face in his neck. As an Owens, family meant everything to Darcy, but she never imagined…

In the kitchen, on a path they had only to choose to make it so, the aunts turned as one to smile at Darcy and Steve.

Aunt Jet reminded Darcy, “A bathtub is simply another type of cauldron, darling. You reap what you brew.”

“One at a time, though.” Aunt Fran winked and they found themselves back in bed, dusted with snow flurries.

“We should name him Rowan Abraham,” Darcy whispered into Steve’s shoulder as his hand curved gently over her belly.

“Our first boy?” Steve chuckled, still in disbelief. Neither of them thought it was possible, but now, just knowing there could be more, _two_ _more_ beautiful children with this woman he loved more than life or duty or country… Then, Steve realized what she’d said. “Rowan Abraham?”

Darcy smiled softly. “We’ll name him for Erskine. Someone should.”

“Someone should,” Steve agreed readily, pulling her over him for a repeat of their magical morning to be good and sure fate knew _this_ was their path, the one they’d chosen together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another name for [the Rowan tree](http://www.thegoddesstree.com/trees/Rowan.htm) is Thor's Helper. (^_^)
> 
> The End. (for now ;-) )

**Author's Note:**

> This story is part of the [LLF Comment Project](https://longlivefeedback.tumblr.com/llfcommentproject), which was created to improve communication between readers and authors. This author invites and appreciates feedback, including:  
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